


And the Night Rambles On

by HigherMagic



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Zombie Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - No Zombies, Alternate Universe - Serial Killers, Blood, Gunshot Wounds, Hero Worship, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Psychopaths In Love, Unhealthy Relationships, Worship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-06
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-05-25 00:39:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6173134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HigherMagic/pseuds/HigherMagic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Rick gets shot during a hunt, Daryl doesn't exactly handle it well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Bennyhatter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bennyhatter/gifts).



> So! I'm breaking into the Walking Dead fandom. I'm not sure what it says about me that my first contribution is a serial killer AU but it's a pretty good idea of what to expect from me.
> 
> Rick and Daryl are in a psychotic relationship that is super unhealthy even by TV's standards, and the 'suicide' tag is because Daryl acknowledges that without Rick he doesn't think he would want to exist. So yay! Super unhealthy codependency.
> 
> Thank you to Benny (to whom this fic is a gift) for being my cheerleader! And also thanks to the wonderful Rickyl authors who already exist and write such awesome things because let me tell you you guys nail it! All the time! It's a huge pool to dip my toe in, I guess is all I have to say.
> 
> This work may get chapters added to it later.

Daryl was used to the sight of blood.

He'd grown up more wildling than man, and the Deep South of Georgia welcomed him like a lover whenever he stepped off the beaten path and into her dark heart. He'd killed, gutted and skinned more animals than he could count, had stitched up his own wounds and spilled his own blood in immeasurable amounts.

But this…

This was entirely different.

His hands shook as he knelt at Rick's side, dirty fingers ripping through fabric to clear a path for his eyes to see the entry wound of the bullet. Rick was still breathing, but barely, his eyes had closed moments before. Right after Daryl had lifted his own weapon and planted one right in the shooter's throat.

"Stupid," he growled to himself, sitting back on his heels and running his hands through his long hair. He didn't care that Rick's blood was smearing across his skin – the metallic, salty scent of it reminded him that Rick was alive. He was still alive, still breathing. If he was bleeding that meant his heart was still beating. "Stupid, son of a _bitch_ , don't you go on me."

There wasn't anything he could really do. If he waited too long, cops would show up, alerted by the shooting. He had to move Rick – Rick would be _pissed_ if he woke up in a hospital bed, or in a jail cell. His anger would come over Georgia like a reckoning if he woke up and Daryl wasn't there, keeping his bed warm and his gun clean and his compass fixed.

His hands still shook but his shoulders were strong, hauling Rick's dead weight up and onto his back and dragging him out of the house. Rick's breathing was shallow, his face pale and skin clammy with sweat, but he was still breathing.

"Don't die," Daryl whispered. "Ain't no one allowed to kill you but me, you get that?"

Rick didn't respond. Daryl worried the inside of his lip, stepped out of the house to make sure no one could see them, and turned to disappear into the wooded area that fringed the neighborhood's backyard.

* * *

Daryl got them back to their safe house within the hour. He had been very careful to drive the speed limit and drove a new vehicle: one that wouldn't have been registered as stolen yet. And he'd pulled Rick's shirt off and given the man his jacket instead so that the blood wasn't such an obvious stain, and wore his old bike gloves to hide the red that had seeped into his fingerprints, etched a place under his fingernails.

He bit at his thumb the whole drive home, achingly sad at the fact that Rick wasn't awake to reprimand him for it. When he'd come off the highway onto the long dirt trail that led to their shelter for the time being, he'd floored it, listening to the engine rev with a reluctant whine.

Damn it, didn't the dumb thing know just what precious cargo it was carrying? How much every second counted?

Their place was little more than a shack, long abandoned by whoever used to own it, but it had good sight lines and a clear shot from all the windows and the door, and was far enough away from the bustle and noise of civilization that unless the dicks were driving a fucking Prius, no one stood a chance of sneaking up on them.

Daryl clambered out of the car and rushed inside, throwing the door open and shoving the weapons and old takeout bags off of the large wooden table that dominated the center of the room so that he would have a space to lay Rick out on. Then, he went back and hauled the unconscious man inside, placing him with utmost gentleness onto the table.

Rick's eyes were moving back and forth behind his eyelids, his breathing was slow but steady.

"Rick," Daryl whispered, petting a hand through the man's sweaty hair. He sucked in a sharp breath, and left one more time to hide the car behind the shack and make sure there were no tell-tale headlights of someone following, before he closed the door, propped a chair up under the handle so that it couldn't be opened easily, and dragged his crossbow and Rick's gun belt to the corner of the room.

He had to get to work. Rick would be pissed at how panicked he had allowed himself to become, but now, in the relative safety of their hideout, Daryl found himself calming down, recalling now what he had to do. There were bags of blood for each of them, stashed in a cooler for exact scenarios like this. Rick was a paranoid person, but a practical one. He hadn't grown up wild like Daryl had, but it was something he'd been born with – a deep-seated distrust and frenzied determination that drew people like Daryl and made sure all possibilities were accounted for.

Rick was the sun, lurking along the horizon of Daryl's existence like an eternal dawn. One day Daryl knew Rick would either break free and light up the sky, or he'd sink below the Earth and disappear forever. Such was the life they led. Rick was the kind of man who urged other men to war, with a voice that could make mountains bow and could make the ragged ocean waves cower in submission. He had the eyes of a wildcat, sharp and steady, a tiger's growl that rendered his prey immobile.

"Rick," Daryl said again, once he'd hooked up one of Rick's blood bags and started the slow drip into his arm. Daryl had never been a junkie like his brother, but he had track marks all the same, as did Rick. Daryl rubbed his thumb over a recent bruise from a bloodletting and tried to swallow around the lump in his throat. Rick didn't move, didn't respond. Daryl lifted his other hand to stroke down the side of his face. "Remember, Rick – I'm the only one s'allowed to kill you. You remember that?"

It had been a secret, soft promise between them. Men like Daryl, men like Rick; they lived fast and quiet and slipped between cities like coyotes in a sheep pen. But Rick had _promised_.

_"Only one gets to kill you is me, sweetheart. Remember that."_

Daryl remembered that night, how he'd bent and spread for Rick, melted before him like molten iron and allowed himself to be poured and molded into whatever shape Rick desired. Daryl had grown up hunting, of course, but he'd never found his favorite prey until Rick had stepped into his life, guided him like a shepherd controls his dog, like a boulder diverts a trickling steam.

When he was sure the blood was going into Rick's body correctly, he set about stitching the wound. The bullet had come clean out the other side, which was good because Daryl knew his hands weren't steady enough to go digging, so he got one of his old fishing hooks and tied a line through it, threading it through each wound until it was sewn shut.

It was ugly, but Rick was beautiful. He always would be.

Satisfied that Rick wasn't going to bleed out, Daryl hauled out the duffle bag of bandages and antiseptic Rick also demanded they keep in stock, and cleaned and wrapped the wound as best he could. He knew he was probably doing things a little out of order, but he didn't give a fuck. As long as Rick survived, Daryl would take any kind of anger the man had over his scar or his pain.

Rick never hurt him.

He could. Oh, he could, and Daryl might even let him.

But he never did.

Daryl knew what he was. He was a shadow man, and danger and darkness followed him like a scent he could never wash off and never hide. But Rick was light – he was hydrogen bombs and solar flares and the deathly hot center of a volcano. If Rick were to disappear, the sky would break and weep for the loss of its sun, and Daryl would fade into the darkness from whence he came. It wouldn't be something as dramatic as suicide, but Daryl knew he would die if Rick did.

"Your call, baby," he said quietly, leaning down to cup Rick's face, brush their noses together, let his lips drag against Rick's open mouth. _Where you go, I'll follow._

As it had always been.

* * *

Daryl kept watch all night, his crossbow always close by. Like Hell was he going to let a no-good sonovabitch get the drop on them again, not like they had at the house.

Fucking _stupid_. The guy wasn't supposed to be there. It was _Daryl's_ job to make sure the house was secure, and he'd fucked it up. God, Rick was going to be _furious_ when he woke up.

But he hadn’t known! He hadn't known that the family that lived there had a friend staying the night. He didn't know that said friend was a light sleeper and crashing on the couch. By the time Rick had had his fun, they'd been about to _leave_. They could have just _left_.

Daryl rubbed a dirty hand across his face, scowling at the flecks of blood itching at his skin. _Rick's blood_. He checked the bag, replaced it with another. Rick's pulse was feather-light but it was there, and the bandages weren't leaking. He'd done a good job sewing the bullet wounds closed, even if it would turn into an ugly knot of scar tissue.

Rick didn't have scars. Rick was flawless, new and crisp as dew-touched grass in the morning. He was untouched by mortal sin even though he wallowed in it day in and day out. He was a God, deigning to touch Earth, to give Daryl a taste of what paradise could be like with a strong, wild thing at his side.

But now Daryl had marked him. Rick didn't like marks, and Daryl knew he really wasn't worthy of leaving them on the man, but now Rick bore a mark from his time with Daryl. Even when the inevitable happened at Rick slipped away from him under the cloak of some night he was too bright to belong to, he would have that wound and know that Daryl was in his flesh, somewhere, burrowed into his bones and DNA. Daryl would be able to come for him in the night, in the crack of a bone that still held remnants of a drug long-abandoned.

Rick always came for Daryl. No matter what. Now he'd never be able to leave.

"I love you," Daryl said, rubbing his thumb across Rick's brow. He should clean Rick up, wipe his face, put him in clean clothes, but the thought of moving Rick now was one he couldn't stomach. If it jostled his wound or broke his stitches and he got hurt because of it, Daryl couldn't survive.

He ate from their rations – enough for him and enough that he could chew it and open Rick's mouth, work it in with his tongue and pet Rick's throat until he swallowed. Taking care of Rick was something that was second nature to him – since they'd met; Rick was Daryl's entire world, his existence. Without Rick by his side Daryl would crumble into dust, wander until his bones wore down to sand and he became one with the Earth again.

Maybe then he would find Rick on another horizon.

* * *

 

Rick slept for two days and three nights. Daryl fed him, kept the blood pumping into his system, cleaned his face and bandages every hour like clockwork, and kept watch. He fell asleep fitfully, little bursts of minutes that felt like betrayals and made his headache worse by the second.

Eventually, though, Rick stirred with a grunt. It was a soft sound but had Daryl shooting to wakefulness in a second, going over to Rick's side to cradle the back of his head gently and help him sit up.

"Easy, Rick," he coaxed, his fingers threading through soft, sweat-damp curls. He rubbed his thumb underneath Rick's ear, his other hand pressed mindfully against Rick's bandages, careful not to get them peeling or tugging on his stitches.

Rick grimaced, his hand flattening over Daryl's on his side, and gritted his teeth.

"You were shot," Daryl said, his voice still so soft like he was trying to talk a jungle cat down from killing him. Rick's eyes opened, blinked once, twice, sharp and blue as a cloudless summer sky and God, he's so beautiful Daryl wanted to fall to his knees at that moment.

Only caution kept his legs steady, unwilling to do anything to jar Rick's movements. He watched Rick's eyes take in the scene, watched as Rick raised a hand to his mouth to wipe his lips of the taste of what Daryl had managed to feed him.

Then, Rick turned his head. They were so close that their noses brushed when he did so, and just like that first time – just like every time after – Daryl lost himself in those eyes. They were the eyes of a man standing on a bridge over the freeway, the eyes of the first man to see the Earth from space; equal parts wondering and bleak and vicious and kind.

Daryl licked his lips, ground his molars together, and bowed to the grip of Rick's hand on the back of his head, pulling him in. Rick's fingers held him tightly, fingers catching on the knots in his hair. Rick would have to cut it again soon.

He loved when Rick cut his hair. There was a very specific, careful kind of ownership in that – the fact that Rick took pride in what he owned enough to keep it looking a certain way. The feeling of Rick's sharp knife and clever fingers skating along his neck, flirting with the line between intentional danger and mastery.

That thought, combined with the look in Rick's eyes, sent a shiver through him as their lips met. It was a soft thing, but an insistent kiss, like Rick had fought through the armies of Hell to lay claim on Daryl's mouth. Maybe he had. Who knew what men like them would see when they were clinging by the fingertips to the land of the living.

Daryl let out a shaky breath against Rick's mouth, his thighs digging into the edge of the table as he pressed himself closer and Rick pulled him in, until Daryl's hands braced him up on either side of Rick's hips, until both of Rick's hands were in Daryl's hair and clinging to the back of his neck.

Rick pulled away, finally, his eyes overtaken by black, and rested their foreheads together. Daryl bit back a whine, knowing the sound made him appear as a beaten stray, desperate for its master's touch – but that was what he was. That was what Rick made him. Rick was a God of the Georgia wild and Daryl his consort, his loyal worshipper.

They stared at each other for a long time. Rick had a power, a voice, that could make the dead rise up and follow him, but his silences made Daryl want to slide to his knees and run his hands along Rick's body, worship him in the carnal way he'd always been taught was wrong before Rick saved him from his feral self.

So he went to his knees again, watching with an open mouth and wide eyes as Rick swung his legs around and parted them just enough to make room for Daryl between them. Daryl stretched his body upwards to try and keep their foreheads together, only parting and settling back on his heels when Rick loosened his grip in Daryl's hair and let him sink down into his adoration. Daryl's hands ran up Rick's thighs, fingertips running along the edge of his bandages.

Rick's mouth twitched upwards, but he didn't flinch. Rick never flinched. He never backed down.

"Thought you were gonna leave me," Daryl whispered, and even his voice was too loud, too bracing against the church that their hideout had become. The cement floor, artfully dripped with Rick's blood, made his knees ache, and he was exhausted from lack of sleep and hungry to the point where his gut clenched in the same kind of aching sadness that the thought of leaving Rick caused.

Even still, he would do whatever Rick asked of him now. Because he was still alive, and if he was still alive then it meant he was willing to fight to keep Daryl by his side, standing one step behind him on his right, as it always should be.

Rick smiled, then – cool and blessed as a winter wind, and ran his knuckles along Daryl's cheekbone, one finger tracing the line around his eye and pushing his hair back from his face. "Not ever gonna leave you, sweetheart," he said, his voice raspy from disuse.

Daryl gasped, his fingers tightening on Rick's thighs again as he leaned up onto his knees, sitting forward so that he could accept the gentle kiss Rick laid to his forehead. He'd seen with his own eyes the kind of cruelty and sadism Rick was capable of, but Rick treated Daryl with so much gentleness that, had he not seen it, he wouldn't have believed the tales. Even the wildness in Rick's eyes only hinted at the things the man was capable of.

"I killed him," he growled into Rick's chest. "The bastard who shot you. Put a bolt right in his neck."

Rick chuckled, and even though the action must have hurt, he showed no sign of feeling the pain. But Rick liked pain. It made him joyful, his smile like the first pink touches of sunrise on the horizon.

"Of course you did," he replied, his lips brushing Daryl's hair. One of his hands cupped the back of Daryl's neck again, the pressure soothing and steadying, the weight of a collar on an animal desperately needing to belong to somebody. "Made 'im die slow, didn't you?"

Daryl nodded, warm pride flowing down his spine at the approval in Rick's voice. After all these years, Daryl could tell Rick's mood just from the way he said Daryl's name, in the rhythm his fingers tapped out on the steering wheel. He knew what it was when Rick cocked his head at a certain angle, stepped left between two houses with his eyes narrowed and his fingers twitching by his sides. He knew Rick bored, giddy, ruthless, tired. He _knew_ this man.

"He hurt you," Daryl murmured into Rick's neck, pushing up on the balls of his feet until he could reach, nosing along the flexing tendon and insides fluttering with the feel of Rick's pulse, fast and steady and _alive_ , under his lips. "Wasn't gonna let the bastard live after that."

Rick laughed again, fisting his hand in Daryl's hair to pull him back, and shoved himself to his feet. The IV tube fell out, blood smearing through the hair on his arm, but neither of them paid it any mind. Rick turned them; his mouth guiding the tilt of Daryl's head, his fingers pushing against Daryl's shoulders, his hips spinning Daryl's around until the backs of Daryl's legs hit the table. He stumbled, righted himself against Rick's body and let out a pitiful moan when Rick licked at his lower lip, tender and sore from Daryl worrying at it for almost three solid days.

Rick hummed, his eyes the same blue as the bottom of a clear lake, dark and dangerous with how they could lie to a swimmer who tried to dive in. Those kinds of lakes are miles deep but look like puddles and pull the wayward in until they drown. Daryl would drown, over and over, because only Rick is allowed to do that. Only Rick has the power to hold his head under. He would give his last breath for the man.

Rick looked him up and down, the look of a man in a whorehouse or a wildcat stalking its prey. Finally he let Daryl go, his fingertips dragging across the dark circles under Daryl's eyes, catching the slight, exhausted shake of his arms. "You been sleepin'?" he asked, frowning when Daryl shook his head. "Ate?"

Daryl shrugged one shoulder. "A little," he replied. "You were more important."

It was an unspoken rule. As long as Rick survived, the world would keep spinning. Daryl couldn't imagine that existence would want to go on if Rick were to die. The world would mourn the loss of one of its last true wonders. _Daryl_ couldn't go on if Rick was gone: the world may as well burn with him.

Rick frowned again. He always did when Daryl ignored his own needs. Like he was as important as Rick was. "Come with me," he said, holding out his hand and Daryl took it and allowed Rick to lead him over to where they stored their dried and canned food. Rick grabbed two bags of jerky off one of the shelves, at a height where he wouldn't have to bend, and snagged a can of peaches as well – Daryl's favorite. They always took some from the houses they searched if they had the time and the space for them.

Daryl smiled, taking the can, overwhelmed at Rick's kindness and the gentle, loving brush of Rick's fingers over his. They went back to the table and sat down on it, Rick absently gnawing on his bag of jerky while Daryl cut open the can of peaches with his knife and gingerly skewered each slippery slice with the same weapon.

"I'm not done with that neighborhood," Rick said after a while. His eyes were gleaming, almost silver in the fading moonlight. The colors of the sky were just about to change.

Daryl nodded. He knew. That house they hit was the first one, but there were at least half a dozen like it in that cul-de-sac alone. People who had done wrong, people who deserved to die. Rick knew. Rick was a prophet, a horseman in the first cavalry wave. They were fighting a war against sin and corruption.

Rick had dreams about these people. Whoever he dreamed about had to die. Daryl knew, one day, he'd be in Rick's dream and Rick would aim that pretty Sheriff's pistol at him and he would die. But he also knew that there were only two bullets left in that gun. A romantic part of him believed Rick when he said that the last bullet was for him, that when Daryl left this world Rick wouldn't be far behind, but he never paid much mind to that because that still meant that there would one day be a world in which Rick didn't exist, and Daryl didn't like to think about that.

They were wanderers, their names whispered between lovers at night for fear of doing wrong, their faces plastered on TV stations and in newspapers, and their reputation spreading far and wide. They were dangerous, _murderers_ , serial killers, _evil_. 

He shrugged one shoulder, digging out the last peach and tilting the can up to drink the heavy syrup.

Rick caught his chin when he was done; turning him with such severity that Daryl almost fell off the table. Rick had that wild look in him again, the same energy that must have formed the first men out of mud and dust, the part of humankind that ran on instinct and _kill or be killed_.

Daryl dipped his shoulders, lowered his eyes, and whimpered when Rick kissed him, meat and sweet fruit balancing on their tongues.

When Rick pulled back, his chest heaved, his teeth showing behind his parted lips. "God, I love you," he said, with the same rough certainty as tectonic plates sliding together, the same inevitable collision as a crashing plane.

Daryl's soul leapt, between their skins and filling the air with enough joy he was sure all of Heaven could see it. "I love you, too," he replied, his answer the quiet breeze in an icy cave, stirring whatever great beast slumbered within.

Rick smiled. "Then come on, sweetheart," he said, pushing himself upright on legs that could survive the Earth crumbling down around them, straitening shoulders that bore the entire sky. "Let's go hunt."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daryl isn't used to feeling things like this. But with Rick, all he knows is hunger and want.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This takes place vaguely before the first chapter does. No specific timeline, though.  
> Again, I remind people that their relationship is purposefully unhealthy and co-dependent and, well, dangerous. Definitely not one for the life goals.  
> Unbeta'd.

Daryl knew better than to question Rick. It wasn't necessary for their relationship to work – Rick led, and Daryl followed like a loyal dog, like the weapon always held at Rick's thigh, like the tug of the sun burning orange behind someone's eyelids.

Still, he was wary. Rick had taken him hunting before, and had awoken in Daryl the thirst for blood and flesh that his master always had, but this was different.

"You kill a cop, they'll never stop hunting you," he said, eyeing the face of the woman on the newspaper that Rick had thrown in front of him. She was a petite woman, with wide, solemn grey eyes and tightly-pulled-back black hair.

Rick had smiled at him, grabbed his chin like one would hold the head of a snake, tilting his head up to bare his throat as he gazed up at Rick. "Hunting _us_ , darlin'," he purred, letting his nails dig into the soft underside of Daryl's throat, behind his jawbone. "Not goin' soft on me, are ya?"

" _No_ ," Daryl replied, his eyes wide. Because there was life on the run with Rick, and then there was life without Rick at all, and Daryl would kill any last son of a bitch that stood between him and this man, who put him at ease like shade in the desert and replenished him like food after a forty-day fast. Daryl had been wandering, without direction and without purpose, before Rick.

He stood up, the both of them too close for air to slip between. Rick let his chin go, eyes hooded and teeth showing in his grin, and flattened a hand down Daryl's chest, letting it rest above his heart.

"You won't leave me, will you?" Rick asked. His eyes were that same beautiful blue, but flat now like an ocean before the first tidal wave – the waters had receded, gathering up speed and anger, and they'd crash over Daryl if he was foolish enough to run onto shore.

But of course he would run. Anything to drown in Rick. "Never," he vowed – a promise he'd die before breaking. He reached out to hold Rick's hips, keeping him close as Rick smiled at him. "I'm yours."

Rick hummed, eyes hooded, gleaming like stone trapped in the mountainside. Daryl wanted to carve out a place for Rick there, seal his soul and his name into the cavern beneath his skin, wear Rick's brand like a tattoo, a mark on his face and his hands, blood-red like the rest of them.

"Mine," Rick whispered, sounding almost awed, and cupped Daryl's cheek with a gentle hand – a hand that could turn to claws and pain in a second, faster than it took to count a heartbeat. "I like the sound of that."

 

 

 

Rick had slit her throat and knelt in front of her while she bled out and died, her hands against her neck and her wide eyes on him. If Daryl were the jealous type, he'd ask why it had looked like she knew him so damn well – but Daryl wasn't jealous, and he wasn't curious enough to lose his head, either. He knew next to nothing of Rick's past, and Rick had never asked about his. They didn't need to know that about each other. All that mattered was Rick's love and his loyalty and all he asked for was Daryl's in return.

And Daryl gave him that. Freely, without hesitation, without regret.

The sirens chased them out of town, hot on their heels as Rick grinned and sang off-key in the driver's seat and Daryl fed him pieces of KitKat bars whenever he asked for one. The red and blue flashing lights made Rick's skin glow, tanned and fine in the frame of the windshield.

They lost them somewhere between one town and the next, either by jurisdiction or because cops never kept their tanks full in King's County. How Rick knew that, Daryl didn't ask, nor did he care.

The answer became obvious when he saw it.

A roadblock.

He looked over at Rick, tense and unsure. If Rick wanted him to fight then he would fight, but Rick always had a plan.

"They're still behind us," he said.

Rick's face was flat and expressionless, unreadable as the white theatre masks, his eyes fixed on the line of cars in front of them. They were going downhill, and there was a sharp turn ahead that turned into a steep hill downwards into trees. And Daryl knew.

Rick reached out and took his hand, and pushed down on the gas pedal.

"Not gonna let them take ya, darlin'," he said, tilting his head just slightly to look at Daryl out of the corner of his eye. His lips quirked up. "And you're not gonna leave me, right?"

"No," Daryl said hoarsely, before he sat back and faced forward. Rick laughed and let go of his hand to turn the radio off.

 

 

 

 

Daryl had known pain, and he knew the forest better than his own hand. He crawled on his hands and knees, blood seeping out of a deep gash in his stomach and a cut on his forehead. If they had dogs, they were fucked. Otherwise they wouldn't find him, as he flattened to his injured stomach and crawled along until he was covered by thick underbrush.

A hand grabbed his ankle and he kicked and snarled as much as he could, but he was injured and no match for the strength of whatever man had found him. Strong hands caught his wrists and wrenched them behind his back and Daryl growled again, throwing his head back to try and head-butt the man.

Laughter, rich and warm like whiskey, settled over his shoulder like a cloak and all the fight bled out of him. "Don't fight me, darlin'," Rick said, leaning down to whisper in his ear in a voice that made Daryl tremble down to his bones. "Can you walk?"

Daryl heaved in a breath, and nodded. Rick got off him and hauled him to his feet and Daryl winced, pressing a hand to his bloody stomach. It was deep but not wide and not a long cut – a shard of windshield glass had found its way through him when he'd been thrown from the car.

Rick pressed his forehead against Daryl's cheek and rested a hand over Daryl's. "I'll fix you, darlin'," he said, his voice so gentle that Daryl felt as weak as a newborn lamb. He bit the inside of his lower lip to stop himself whining and begging for Rick's gentle touch. "We need to go."

Daryl knew – he could hear the sounds of pursuit. Men with heavy boots and loud voices who didn't understand the forest would follow them, but they'd be long-gone by the time they reached the ravine. The car was wrecked, probably, all the weapons inside of it gone, their DNA and fingerprints forever logged into the system. It didn't matter – if they were ever caught, they'd be dead. It didn't matter.

Rick led him, steady and sure, to a road, and from there, a cabin hidden deep within the woods. It wasn't far but it would do for the night, Daryl was sure. Once inside he helped Rick bar the windows and block the door, just in case.

Then, Daryl sat down on a chair at Rick's coaxing and Rick pulled up his shirt, exposing the wound on his stomach. Rick's eyes were dark, that familiar hunger on his face as he looked Daryl over, but Daryl had no fear of him. Rick could hurt him without a thought, he was sure – and, he was sure, Rick had thought about it multiple times if only for the sick thrill of the thing – but Daryl was not tense under his hands and didn't even flinch when Rick leaned down and pressed his cheek against the smear of blood on Daryl's abdomen, breathing deeply.

"You're so good for me, Daryl," he said, and Daryl did flinch, then, his heartbeat stuttering with longing and love. "Stay here. I'll find something to stitch you up."

He rose, blood on his cheek and on his nose – hit from the airbag, most likely. There was a dark red mark on his neck from the seatbelt, his hands and face were scratched up, but they were superficial things. His body was likely bruised and scraped but not deeply injured – just as it should be. Rick should never be wounded, never wear the scars and marks of evil on his body like Daryl did. Rick was Dorian Grey, perfect and flawless, and Daryl the portrait in the attic that held all of his sin.

Rick managed to find some old fishing line and a needle. The line was too thick to thread through the hole so he simply tied it around the slightly bulbous end. It would hurt more and leave another ugly scar for Daryl to bear, but he was ready for it – if for no other reason than to have Rick's hands on his skin again.

"Be still," Rick said, in a tone that the powerful and Holy use to calm seas and storms, and Daryl nodded, sucking in a breath and biting his lip as Rick got to work. The needle hurt, rough and quick as Rick's hands were as he worked, but soon it was done. Rick wiped the edge of his shirt over the wound to make sure it wasn't still bleeding, and then he rose up onto his feet.

"Come here," he said, and Daryl sat up and let Rick pull his bloody shirt over his head, tossing it to one side. As soon as he was bare for Rick's gaze he lowered his eyes, unsure and unworthy. Daryl knew, at this point, that Rick must know how much he loved him, but there was hardly time in their world for stuff like that. When the blood-high was running through them there were kisses, touches, movements like fire and blood across Daryl's skin, but that wasn't love. That wasn't passion, ardor, the kinds of things people wrote songs and poetry about.

Rick took his chin again, tilting his gaze up. "Stand with me," he said, and Daryl rose obediently, unable to look away from Rick's eyes. They were softer now – less like an oncoming storm and more like the sky in Georgia in the summer. Daryl loved how expressive Rick's eyes were, and thanked himself so lucky that he had been around long enough to read every single nuance in them.

Rick's gaze dropped to Daryl's mouth, then back up again, and Daryl sighed, resting their foreheads together. "You could have been killed," he said, dragging his fingertips feather-light up Rick's arm until he reached the sleeve of his shirt.

Rick grinned at him. "Only one allowed to kill me is you, sweetheart," he replied, equally soft, wind amongst the wild trees, stirring up warmth and dust. "Remember that."

"Then you ain't ever gonna die," Daryl said, unable to stop himself smiling back.

At that, Rick's eyes darkened. "I know," he said, dropping Daryl's chin and grabbing his arm instead, walking him back towards the wall of the cabin. Daryl's shoulders hit old wood, damp and rotting under his weight, but holding strong against him as Rick pressed closer. "You'd do anything for me, wouldn't you, darlin'? Even die, if I asked you to."

Daryl nodded. "I would."

"Why?"

 _Because I love you_. "I think you know the answer to that one."

Rick blinked at him, head tilted, eyes moving like a tiger mapping out the best parts to bite and rip into its kill. "I do know," he finally said. His hands landed, reverently gentle, on the sides of Daryl's face, cupping his jaw, one thumb brushing on his lower lip.

"I'd do anything for you, Rick," Daryl said.

Rick raised an eyebrow. "Anything?"

"I'd die for you."

And it was true – Rick knew that already. If nothing else the moments before the car crash proved that. If Rick asked him to, Daryl would lay down his life if only to earn his favor in those final moments. Rick was beautiful, and pure, and worth protecting with every drop of blood Daryl could give.

Rick growled, pulling away. "You're not gonna leave me," he snapped, anger darkening his pretty eyes and turning his smile into something disgusted. "You're not gonna die. Only one gets to kill you is me. _Me_ , you get that?"

And it was fucked up, how that sentiment made Daryl feel warm and powerful in the pit of his chest. "I know," he said, reaching out and stilling Rick's pacing with just a touch. One touch and Rick was gone from the prowling predator to one tense, ready to leap and beat itself bloody against the bars of its cage.

Rick faced him and Daryl went to his knees, the joints unable to keep his weight under Rick's powerful stare – it was as though the sky had fallen onto his shoulders and Daryl was no God, nothing compared to Rick, could not keep the weight of such things on him without falling. He held Rick's thighs and pulls him close, forehead against Rick's abdomen.

"I ain't leavin'," he said, his chest bursting with relief when one of Rick's hands fell to his hair, petting him gently. "I ain't. I'd never."

Rick tugged on his hair, forcing him to tilt his head back. "Never," he breathed, his head cocked to one side, something wild and hungry on his face. Daryl knew that kind of hunger – he'd felt it ever since Rick had held out his hand and whispered ' _Follow me_ ', in the voice that could have charmed the Devil out of his own throne.

"Never," he whispered back, as Rick's other hand fell to his belt and slowly started to pull it free. Daryl helped him, his hands tugging at the belt and then Rick's button and zip of his jeans, pulling them apart and away from the man's underwear. Daryl leaned in, eyes up, and mouthed at the outline of Rick's cock through his underwear, in love with the scent of him, musky and heavy like something he could already taste.

" _Daryl_ ," Rick gasped, head tilting back, and Daryl would pay a thousand lives if only to have Rick say his name like that all the time, like he was breaking apart and desperate for something only Daryl could provide him. Daryl tugged on the edge of Rick's underwear until he could free his erection and held it firmly at the base. He ran his tongue along the tip and sucked the head into his mouth, cheeks hollowing as he tried to make it as tight and wet as he could.

Rick's hand tightened in his head, his breath shuddering out of his mouth as he tilted his head forward again and looked down at Daryl. He leaned forward, free hand bracing himself against the old wooden wall behind Daryl, and gently rocked his hips forward. Daryl let go and tried to swallow with as much grace as he could muster, his hands resting against Rick's thighs to stop him going too deep too soon.

He tilted his head and let his gaze fall as Rick continued to thrust gently in and out of his mouth, the other man's eyes half-lidded and heavy, his mouth open, breathing ragged. Daryl tucked his teeth as best he could, ran his tongue along the bottom of Rick's cock every time Rick pulled back, sucked as hard as he could when Rick sank back into him again. Rick's hand in his hair held him steady, tight but not pulling.

Soon, when his lungs started to burn from the snatches of breath he could take and the corners of his eyes were starting to well up with tears, Rick pulled out completely, a low snarl falling from him when his cock left the warmth of Daryl's mouth, and he let go of Daryl's hair to wrap his hand around it instead, pumping twice.

"I want to _mark_ you," Rick hissed, his voice little more than a rumble in his chest, prowling somewhere deep and primal. Daryl opened his eyes, kept his face tilted up, waiting. "You're _mine_. You promised me."

"I am," Daryl said, words rough from his abused throat.

Rick let out a rough, animal sound, his upper lip pulled back just for a second. "Stand up," he commanded and Daryl scrambled to his feet, his shoulder hitting the underside of the arm Rick still had braced against the wall.

Then Rick sank against him, the hand on the wall finding Daryl's hair and tightening, his other hand leaving his cock and grabbing Daryl's side as he ground against Daryl, shoving him with more and more force against the rotting cabin wall.

And Rick kissed him – a dirty, hot thing that made Daryl's gut clench and his knees shake. He held Rick by the waist, nails against the man's back through his shirt, legs spread so that Rick's cock could grind against his stomach, just shy of the wound he'd gotten from the car crash. It ached, but being with Rick would always ache – in the way that junkies craved their high Daryl lusted after this man, with all the pain and the freedom he brought.

Rick pulled back just enough for his mouth to find Daryl's neck, and he bit down, earning a high, whining sound from Daryl as he clung to Rick and let him rut. Rick shuddered, growling against Daryl's skin as he came, spilling hot and wet between their stomachs and chests.

Daryl's breath left him in a shaky sigh, as though he had been the one to come, but thank God Rick was there to brace him or he might have fallen to his knees all over again.

Rick's hand left his hair while his mouth claimed Daryl's in another kiss, hand falling to their dirty stomachs. His fingers smeared through the dried blood and the drying come there, dragging it around like some kind of macabre finger paint. Daryl shivered, goosebumps breaking out down his arms at the simple, possessive gesture, and when Rick pulled back from him he let out another pitiful whine.

Rick sighed, smiling. "You're so perfect, Daryl," he whispered, dragging his dirty fingers across Daryl's lips. Daryl didn't even think about licking them, or sucking Rick's fingers into his mouth when they were offered. Rick's smile grew. "And all mine."

Daryl nodded, taking in a deep, unsteady breath. Rick pulled back and put himself away, fixing his clothes, and Daryl was left, shaky and unsure, against the wall.

"We should move on," Rick said, going to one of the windows and gazing out into the darkness. "They'll have almost caught up to us if they're as stubborn as I remember."

Daryl nodded, his brain abruptly switching gears from lust to survival. With Rick, everything had to be able to change at the drop of a hat, just like his lover's mercurial moods.

"Leave the shirt, it'll only draw the scent of dogs," he ordered, pulling the chair away from the door and gesturing for Daryl to come to him. "We'll head north, to the safe house, and grab all our stuff there and keep driving west."

Daryl nodded, following Rick silently out of the cabin, his ears and eyes sensitive to any twitch and shift of life in the forest as they moved. It was almost completely dark, not even the moon giving enough light to see by, but Daryl and Rick were wild now and they knew the lay of the land better than any city-bred cop could ever dream to.


End file.
